Page 34 - robinson-crusoe

furious creatures which harbour there; so that the Moors
use it for their hunting only, where they go like an army,
two or three thousand men at a time; and indeed for near a
hundred miles together upon this coast we saw nothing but
a waste, uninhabited country by day, and heard nothing but
howlings and roaring of wild beasts by night.
Once or twice in the daytime I thought I saw the Pico of
Teneriffe, being the high top of the Mountain Teneriffe in
the Canaries, and had a great mind to venture out, in hopes
of reaching thither; but having tried twice, I was forced in
again by contrary winds, the sea also going too high for my
little vessel; so, I resolved to pursue my first design, and
keep along the shore.
Several times I was obliged to land for fresh water, after
we had left this place; and once in particular, being early in
morning, we came to an anchor under a little point of land,
which was pretty high; and the tide beginning to flow, we
lay still to go farther in. Xury, whose eyes were more about
him than it seems mine were, calls softly to me, and tells me
that we had best go farther off the shore; ‘For,’ says he, ‘look,
yonder lies a dreadful monster on the side of that hillock,
fast asleep.’ I looked where he pointed, and saw a dreadful
monster indeed, for it was a terrible, great lion that lay on
the side of the shore, under the shade of a piece of the hill
that hung as it were a little over him. ‘Xury,’ says I, ‘you
shall on shore and kill him.’ Xury, looked frighted, and said,
‘Me kill! he eat me at one mouth!’ - one mouthful he meant.
However, I said no more to the boy, but bade him lie still,
and I took our biggest gun, which was almost musket-bore,